


sail on, silver girl

by roxast



Series: a little bit louder now (an fma college au) [1]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Car Accident mention, Dad Scar!!!, Disabled Character, Family, Gen, Mentions of Racism, Mystery, Other, Scar trying to be a good dad to his brother's adopted kid and taking a job he hates, hijinks ensue, house fire mention, no murder!!! none!!!, op can't decide if this is set in amestris or america but k-pop exists so do with that what u will, security guard au?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2020-05-19 08:37:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19353385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roxast/pseuds/roxast
Summary: And there was no time to flinch when Mei had taken one look at him, back at the screen, and back at him, before slapping a chubby four-year-old hand on his forehead, thus dubbing him “Scar” like this was a strange sort of knighting ceremony. It was the real moment, as Miles might say, he had gone “soft”.[Or, Scar's first year at Central State University, and the balancing act that is raising your preteen niece, keeping your boss sane, and saving the campus from certain doom.]





	1. an august prologue

**Author's Note:**

> yo yo yo
> 
> there weren't enough dad!Scar fics on this website so I decided to fill the void. 
> 
> this fic is going to be part of a larger series of fics. i'm still trying to decide if I should complete one full fic at a time or if I should post chapters in their chronological order. i'm also still trying to decide if I have the time and energy to dedicate to what will likely be a large and ambitious project but like, that's life babey
> 
> don't find me on social media i don't want to be found (reviews are great tho lmao)
> 
> \--
> 
> UPDATE (1/19/20): WOW this fic has gotten some traction, and I am nothing but grateful! This fic, in particular, feels like my baby and I'm committed to it reaching it's full potential, so thank you all for your support! I've included fan art drawn by wonderful bunsik.tumblr.com in each of the chapters here forward. The links to each piece will be listed in the notes/linked as well. Danielle is wildly talented and also a very bright person--she gets these characters with a great deal of compassion and honesty and it shows in her work! Please support her on tumblr if you have one, because I don't lmao. 
> 
> you can follow me on twitter now @_roxast if that's you're thing

The morning of Mei’s thirteenth birthday was also her first day at a new school in a new city, so it was high time that she accept two new privileges with the utmost humility and concern, as was explained to her gravely.

First, she was allowed to sit in the front seat. 

Second, with these front seat privileges came aux cord privileges, and thus Mei was bestowed with the ultimate role as “DJ”. 

(Two pairs of sunglasses sat in the cup holder between the driver’s and the passenger’s seat of their old Chevrolet minivan that he’d been left in the estate. One was a pair of silver men’s athletic sunglasses, more than a little scratched on the side. One was a little girl’s pair of pink, heart-shaped sunglasses, rimless and shiny. They’d put them on in near tandem before starting the car and pulling out of their driveway, a perk of the new condo they hadn’t had back East.)

“Uncle Scar, the way you started made me think this whole ride was going to be some kind of stranger danger lecture or something,” Mei laughed, gleefully hooking her phone with the little panda keychain up to the stereo’s auxiliary cord.

“It can be. It’s not too late,” Scar replied, effortlessly keeping his expression straight, sarcasm barely detectable to the untrained eye.

Mei, well-trained, released a sweet, small snort. “Also, you always let me pick out music if I want to,” she replied, ignoring what Scar had thought was a generous offer. “Today really isn’t different.”

“That may be true, but you’ve never gotten to decide on music _in the front seat_ as,” he took a deep breath, “ _DJ Meiiiiiii,_ ” Scar bellowed, his deep voice sinking into the abyss usually reserved only for raves and Darth Vader.

She probably didn’t see him, but he pulled a small smile at the sounds of the girlish, giddy laughter roaring in the passenger seat as she tried to mimic him through the giggles. “DJ Mei _-hehehe_ , DJ MEEEEEE _iiiihhahhahaha_ ”.

(Be honest, he could’ve been a jovial spirit, eloquent and bright, and it wouldn’t matter. It hadn’t mattered for his brother, and he’d always been the nice one. Mei and Scar could buy groceries if double takes were quarters; no matter what, they’d always be seen by strangers as _large, gruff, brown_ and _small, weak, not his kid_. Every possible guess as to their relationship, since it clearly wasn’t blood, came before “legal guardian”. Mei was never one for guessing games, and as far as he knew, seemed to understand both his sense of humor and their familial structure.)

Turning out of their new neighborhood and into the downtown streets of Central, Scar elected to ignore the fact that maybe Mei’s legs were still a little too short to fully reach the floor of the car.

He was never the optimist, but it seemed, with the sun shining in the cloudless August sky and with the navigation around the city getting more and more familiar without the use of Siri, that maybe, the two of them would have a _good_ first day, or first real day of what their lives would be like going forward. The in-between days didn't count; adjusting to the move and the promise of a new life had been that special kind of difficulty that was too exhausting to even consider naming after hours spent lifting boxes and not knowing exactly where they were in proximity to any other given thing at any given time. But they had made it this far, didn’t they? The ground hadn't noticed two strangers (and their cat) from a strange land on it's soil and tried to swallow them up, right? The world wasn’t ending around them, they were just driving to school, and in the moment it all didn’t seem so daunting. Not with Mei, being herself, dancing in her seat to some pop diva whose name he could never remember, and unsuspectingly crossing off every line of the checklist Scar started his mornings with for nearly four years now. 

Number One: was Mei alive and breathing? Check (and with flying colors, as she belted with passion something in-between shouts of “Run aWAy with ME”). 

Number Two: was Mei healthy and well? Check (she hadn’t complained about feeling sick or nervous or pretended to be sick because she was nervous, which was likely a good sign. If she didn’t protest too heavily, he could always put a hand to her forehead before she got out of the car to be absolutely sure). 

Number Three: was Mei happy? Check (they’d bought new shoes last night, bright pink in some overpriced brand that he couldn’t remember the name of, that she’d nearly worn out of the store. He wasn’t so foolish to expect this to quell any and all anxieties she might have about starting her life over almost completely, on her birthday, of all days, but seeing her obvious excitement at something so simple as pink shoes with black and white checked laces, made him thank the high heavens.)

Every day, once Scar went through this list, he took a deep breath, said his morning prayers, got his tea, fed the cat, and moved on. Forgive him for checking twice today. 

(He wasn’t her dad. He couldn’t take his brother’s place, he knew this. His brother, even if she’d called him Dad, still hadn’t really taken the place of the faceless, nameless man that’d been her birth father, wherever he was, clearly missing out. Look at all of the things Scar could do now that he had Mei. Four years ago, his cooking was just short of abhorrent and inedible. Today, he had made pancakes with rainbow sprinkles and put a candle in it and hadn’t set off the smoke alarms. It was like magic what someone could do when they were being relied upon.)

“You know you can call me if something goes wrong,” he said at a red light in a near grunt, intentionally keeping his voice low and quiet lest he betray his own worry.

“Nothing’s going to go wrong,” Mei answered, not stopping in her dance to even look at him.

“If anyone bothers you…”

“Uncle Scar.”

“If you feel sick...”

_“Uncle Scar.”_

“If you think you’ve had enough…”

Mei flipped the stereo volume up nearly twice as loud. “STOP WORRYING ABOUT ME, I’M A BIG GIRL, I CAN HANDLE IT,” she yelled before shooting into the top note of the song’s climactic four-part harmony, maybe just a few steps lower than the actual note, before Scar could say anything to reply.

He pushed his sunglasses up onto his nose, concealing a grin with a grimace as he prayed that someone up there would grant him a sliver of the same brazen courage Mei bore deep in her soul. 

A few songs later and they were in front of Central High, Scar’s stomach now performing Olympic-level gymnastics at the thought of Mei walking in that side of the building alone and why on Earth did all of these children look like adults? Why were they all so tall, who let them get this tall? And - oh wait, his mistake - he pulled the van around the corner of the building, behind the dumpsters to the adjacent parking lot in front of the Central _Junior_ High entrance, taking a soft exhale when he saw that they were surrounded by other obviously parent-owned vehicles and buses oozing children that still seemed to be bigger and more confusing to Scar than Mei (Everything seemed big and strange next to Mei) (Would she fit in? Would she like it here? What if this was a mistake, what if she was miserable, what if he’d made her miserable on her _birthday_ -) 

The seatbelt beside him unclicked, with Mei excitedly grabbing her backpack and lunch box, and checking the two neat buns on the top of her head in the mirror without so much as a second of hesitation.

“School’s out at 3:00!” she reminded him, cheerfully.

“Right,” a grunt in response.

“Wish me luck!” she beamed.

“Good luck,” he replied, a bit softer. 

“Thank you, and good luck to you too!” Mei adjusted the straps to her (surprise) pink backpack as she appeared to be (surprise) scolding him. “Have fun at work today! Make the world a better place! Make some friends! _Smile._ ”

“I…” Smile? Scar huffed, the white pressed collar around his neck suddenly drawing attention to itself. “You too.”

“Oh I know _I_ am, it’s _you_ I’m worried about.” Mei slammed the door shut before turning back around to give him a wave once she stepped up to the curb, mouthing “love you” just as another car behind them in the queue honked. Scar stayed patiently where he was, maybe a little out of spite, to wave back and watch as Mei spun on her heel and nearly skip into the building. 

There was something in his chest maybe, sort of, something like a good thousand words to describe how simultaneously melancholic and proud he was at the same time at the prospect of one day meeting the young woman Mei was growing into. But just as he was not an optimist, he was not a poet, and was not her dad, and so he sniffed his sunglasses up secure on the bridge of his nose and switched on the radio before heading to work.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> link the art in fic: https://bunsik.tumblr.com/image/190060901147


	2. dancin in september

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo yo yo ready for some conflict???
> 
> worth mentioning the title of this fic is from aretha franklin's "bridge over troubled water". simon and garfunkl's too but i specifically was aiming for the aretha version
> 
> again, this fic is part of a larger universe that i'll likely try to update in sequential order of events? there's a sister roy fic concurrent with this one that, i have plans for a few other characters to have their own centric fics in the universe. doesn't matter when, just know shits gonna hit the fan.

8:45 AM. He is issued his replacement “Staff/Student” ID, because while he is used to people intentionally or unintentionally messing up his first name, “Sarik” was not even close. Although, the student working at the front desk of Student Affairs, a sleepy girl with glasses that made her giant eyes appear even bigger, probably had made an honest mistake with his first card. No particular reason why he thought that, he could just tell, and supposedly, that was what would make him good at this job. 

“It’s not hard work,” Miles had told him, several months ago over the phone, when the Campus Security Officer position had first opened. The process of turning a military school into a state university over the last few years had meant also demilitarizing the campus police force, which meant, of course, “too many of the old team left, which means we need someone who can fill out paperwork more than anything else. But it’s a pretty quiet campus all in all.” 

(Scar had been arrested four times, and he did not hesitate to remind Miles of this fact. But Miles had reminded him in turn that charges were never filed, the last arrest was over five years ago, and who honestly gave a shit about someone being arrested for “civil disobedience”? Miles had an arrest too, remember? When they’d chained themselves to the state senate building in more than protest, but justice and visibility? But _who cares_ sounded a little close to _it doesn’t matter_ in Scar’s mind, just like Campus Security Officer sounded a little too close to Cop and like how zip ties could be used instead of handcuffs, his wrists remembered.)

It was the third week of classes when the Central State University Security Officers started breaking out the parking tickets, in an attempt to, what, make the campus more secure? They were supposed to ignore them for the first two weeks, see, because students forget to pick up their parking passes or because sometimes it’s hard to tell on the map where the student parking ends and staff parking begins. Officer Armstrong wanted to start ticketing day one of the semester, 10 AM, after the first two blocks of classes had come and gone, but Miles had been able to talk her out of that. The two week difference between August and September didn’t really make a difference to Scar, as the sun was going to be hot no matter how many hours he spent scanning cars on the pavement for the $200 little yellow sticker that meant, yes, I’m a student, yes, I can park here, no, please do not give me a $20 ticket for doing nothing of import to the spinning world. 

This was how Scar started his workday now. Two weeks down, eight years to go. 

“You’d get along with the boss. She’s a good person, and you’re a little bit alike, I would say,” Miles had continued on, when Scar hadn’t replied to his initial selling point.

He scoffed before he could stop himself. “How so?”

“You both act like you’re big and tough, but really, you have big, soft hearts,” Miles replied, clearly falling into a bit of a smirk by his tone, well-known to Scar and his supposed big, soft heart after years of friendship. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

“Where’s Mei? She would know what I’m talking about, right, _Uncle Scar_?”

(Scar wasn’t his name, obviously, but it was Mei’s nickname for him, and for whatever reason, it stuck a lot stronger than his actual name. She’d given it to him early on in her mother’s relationship with his brother, when he’d put on the Lion King because what else? Did one do? To steer a preschooler toward something soft and still that she’d be able to fall asleep on if she were to calm down for long enough? Without the inevitable battle at 8:30 sharp that would come with telling her it was time for bed? He eventually got her settled on the couch, and was prepared for smooth sailing into bedtime when she’d taken one look at him, back at the screen, back at him, before slapping a chubby four-year-old hand on his forehead, and thus dubbed him “Scar” like a strange sort of knighting ceremony. It was the moment, as Miles might say, he had gone “soft”.)

He had to wear a long sleeved shirt too, see, and a belt. Some kind of black and blue polyester blend thing, in the largest size they had, that was still maybe a bit too tight around the shoulders and stuck to his back when he sweat. It was far from the normal airy, cotton flow in his typical simple attire that kept him from feeling immediately irritated. Militant-looking, reminiscent of the school’s recent history as a military academy, but Scar had no option to wear the short-sleeved polo alternative, not when Officer Armstrong, had stood, a whole head below him, arms crossed and looking even crosser, and said sternly “no tattoos should be visible while you’re in uniform.”

It wasn’t intimidated (he wasn’t, he was _not_ ), but he also wasn’t going to argue for it, not when the lowest line of ink, wrapped around his wrist, could occasionally sneak out of his right sleeve depending on how he moved. If Officer Armstrong had noticed yet, she hadn’t said anything, or wouldn’t say anything, and choose to glare at it instead. And if she didn’t say anything about it, neither Miles nor Officer Buccaneer nor anyone else for that matter, would say something either. 

“Your job, first and foremost, is to protect and serve the students, faculty, and staff of this campus.” Officer Armstrong had barked, day one, and it took a blink to realize she had actually been that serious, handing him a set of keys, a walkie-talkie, a notepad, and a canister of pepper spray that had a permanent home in the bottom drawer of Scar’s desk. “When something goes wrong, _we_ are the first people they call. Failure to live up to that responsibility at any time will not be tolerated.”

There was a long pause, too long, long enough that Armstrong’s typical judgemental squint turned seething. Scar remembered what Miles had mentioned, about being herself a military school grad, from a long family tradition of grads and police officers, and resisted the urge to grunt a response. 

“Yes ma’am,” he said, sure to enunciate. With Armstrong’s head noticeably deflated, he assumed he’d done an alright job. 

“I go by ‘sir’, usually,” she instead stated cooly. 

“Yes _sir_.”

“Your _second_ job,” she continued, glaring, not stopping to ever move her long, blonde hair out of her face, which seemed to Scar like it really should have bothered her at some point, “is to complete whatever task I assign to you, however meaningless and nonsensical it may seem. We keep this campus on the straight and narrow. There are rules for a reason, and work to do.”

Work to do, sure, Scar conceded, taking his seat at the front desk as the first face students would see when walking into this particular wing of the Wellesley Building. Tickets to give to students who hadn’t bothered to pick up their parking passes, doors to unlock for freshmen who’d left their keys in their dorms, fire alarms to check in the science labs and maybe a dorm party to bust on Friday if a RA ever bothered to call in a noise complaint (they never did).

Scar spent the first two weeks avoiding Armstrong and organizing the lost and found, noting that the sheer number of students who lost their wallet on a given day was staggering. 

“There’s a lot of good work happening on the campus too,” Miles' voice sounded tinny on the phone, Scar suspected he’d been cooking or working on something else simultaneously while talking to him. “Now that funding can be requested and moved toward new projects, it’s putting the school in a whole new light. There’s someone in particular, I think, whose work you’d be a good help for.”

And at 12 PM sharp, on his first day and almost every subsequent day after, Miles and Scar ventured to the university’s Office of Religious Life to spend a half hour with the first face students would see when walking into the other wing of the Wellesley Building. It was clear upon meeting Rose, Scar noted, that besides the fact she was clearly a woman of strong faith, that she was very open-hearted, but also despite not _looking_ irritable, ever, even in the slightest, she was, in fact, capital-I- _Irritated_. Rose insisted that “Operations Coordinator” was just a fancy way of saying “secretary” and that even it if it was a step up from waitressing, she was still doing more pencil pushing than praying these days (Miles had conversely insisted that even the most menial tasks were important to her mission, but go on). But Rose discussed fervently, excitedly, it brought her closer to what it was she really wanted to do, which was advocate for Central’s growing refugee population. 

Miles looked at Scar as Rose discussed her plans, Scar noting he had been duped, if for his own good.

(Scar’s parents were refugees, Miles’ grandparents were refugees, and Rose herself was a refugee.)

(One need not spell out the obvious relevance, right?)

And she was making a breakthrough; Rose had plans in process with a psychology professor at the school studying human development, a professor who thought they could do well building a whole outreach program connecting young migrants new to Central with college student mentors, a professor who could help sway the approval of administration to use campus resources (a professor who Rose spoke of with great respect and admiration and who Scar couldn’t seem to remember the name of. Hogan? Homen? Hohaimmen? He’d always been bad with names.) A professor who would come to meet them for lunch one of these days, if he ever finally took a lunch break to do so. Rose might not have looked it at first, but she had a kind of power that could build bridges, roads, paths of connection, Scar thought, and had great, big plans, clearly, plans that could only be pushed forward with administrative approval, which meant funds, which meant - 

“More paperwork,” said Rose, her folded hands saying _‘patience’_ , the curl of her mouth saying _‘irritated’_. 

“Is that the only way anything happens around here?” Scar asked, folding his arms.

“You sound surprised,” Miles said to him, before turning towards Rose. “He’ll help us. He’s good with words, we’ll have this grant written in no time.”

Rose’s face lit up. “You will? You _really_ will?” And that was that. 

(He and his brother used to bicker about where true change could be initiated. Scar leaned towards boots-to-the-ground, elbow-deep activism, helping people immediately with everything he had to give. Even the smallest act could ripple into a wave of goodness, change, justice. His brother, ever the academic, thought research was the best vehicle for those big movements and laid the foundation for the structural change that even greater numbers of people could be ameliorated by. Scar said most regular people don’t read academic papers and his brother said most regular people can’t just chain themselves to the steps of the state senate and hope for the best. Scar said his brother’s work was idealistic, unrealistic, and slow; his brother said Scar’s work was just as idealistic, but with a flair for the dramatic. Good-natured bickering, but bickering nonetheless.)

(After all, when Scar was between paying jobs - bussing tables, working construction, mopping floors, teaching self-defense classes - he always had a place to stay at his brother’s house. After all, they hadn’t gotten matching tattoos, full-sleeve from shoulder to wrist, to show how full of shit the other one was.)

When 3 o’clock rolled around he would pull his cell phone out of his clanky and overwhelmingly empty metal desk to text Mei and make sure she was getting to and from the bus okay (She’d set his phone wallpaper, a photo of Xiao Mei, many years ago when he first hunkered down and bought a real phone. Armstrong saw it once, made an unusual face, and said nothing). Mei would always reply quickly with something chipper and with a lot of emojis and Scar would feel an ever-so-slightly renewed sense of resolve to finish the last two hours of his work day strong. Coming up on a month in a new school, she was coming home with a face that was a little less practiced in its optimism, trying less to assure him that she would adjust and instead just, adjusting. She’d made friends with a girl named Lan Fan, who was into the same Korean bands that she was, apparently. (“You mean k-pop?” Rose asked between pokes at her rice and beans, politely not laughing at him like Miles was. “You can just say k-pop, it’s okay.”) Some of the other guards had photos on their desks of their family; Scar didn't want to get that comfortable and thought this was maybe the next best thing.

(Scar tried to forget that first phone call, and sometimes, he succeeded. He’d fallen asleep on his brother’s couch, still babysitting and still between jobs, only to wake up the next day without a brother. At the end of the day, the police had called it an accident; a bad electrical wire job could be like a time bomb, and the home they'd been at for dinner had been ticking for a while. Scar may not have been the smart one, but he was hardly a fool. Because his brother was born with a target on his back and skin and faith and his sister-in-law’s estranged family were known for making a business out of their family ties and not to be indignant but the only thing that had been a "matter of time" was the retribution for being the wrong faith, for marrying the wrong man, for living as the wrong person. Bad house fires in and out of the news for years and the one house up in smokes that was full of brown people had been deemed "an accident". It was intentional, he had cried, rage wringing and palpable, it was intentional.)

(He’d gotten that first phone call before Mei had even woken up, and between the sudden dissociation he felt between his soul and his body, like if he was still enough of a human being he could get out of here, he _needed_ to _get out of here_ , the fact of the matter hit him suddenly, starkly, smack in the forehead: oh _. Mei._ If he’d woken up without any living family to speak of, the little girl upstairs fast asleep under princess covers, cradling her favorite stuffed panda, had woken up without any living family that would speak to her. It was strange, a stroke of violence purging the whole world until it was an empty dusty wasteland for two and only two people to cross. And what was he supposed to do? But help her along?)

“How much does it pay?” Scar had asked. When Miles gave the number, the knot that got tighter in his stomach the further he was from his next paycheck seemed to briefly alleviate. 

“It’s pretty alright when you don’t have a college degree,” Miles conceded. “The benefits make up for the rest-” wow, what if they could afford dental? “-and then, of course, there’s the tuition discount.”

“Tuition discount?’

“Yeah, if you decided to take some classes, go back to school, or even if Mei decided to go there down the line, there’s remission options. Free courses. That sort of thing.”

The knot disappeared. 

Scar had never been one for math, but the equation had been a simple one. He could go back to school, be an educated man with a degree and get a sturdy job in something he actually liked and didn't just stand _,_  all by the time Mei graduated high school. Four more years, Mei could graduate college. And God knew if money wasn’t the problem, she could work some magic, excel at something smart and sensible and graduate with at least a job and no jail time all while drawing the stars in the sky, while she was at it. If he could just do that, that would be, well, everything. Or maybe, hopefully, just enough.

So he started taking classes. Right after his shift ended at 5 o’clock, he’d change back into his much less repressive and difficult track pants and sneakers, collect his books, and walk past building after building deep into Central State University campus. Scar decided that while he hadn't been quite the academic his brother had been, he liked going to class more now than when he was younger. He found that while words still seemed to swirl on the page and digits might change into a new number if he looked away for too long, he may possibly be more patient now than he had been in school years ago. More steadfast. Certainly with better purpose, but it was still easy to lose sight of a goal when one was working through the basics of Pre-Algebra (numbers and letters, higher education was full of surprises).

(To reiterate, he had not been the smart brother, but Scar was certainly no fool, and as he filled out the adoption papers and signed off with no flourish, he noted with ease the parts of his life that would change when he adopted Mei, even if he would not take away her mother's last name, would not make her convert faiths, would not make her call him father. Scar had been teaching self-defense classes the time, and as he preached to his students, the Earth turned with no reason, but with flow, a flow that could be anticipated and redirected with practice. The three-part checklist he had now started much longer. 3 square meals a day and rides to and from school and making sure she had clean clothes and that she was supervised - Mei came with him, after school, to work, and excelled at martial arts despite being roughly half the size of the other kids her age. He had assumed he would need to spend time helping Mei with her homework, and that was easy at first. In third grade, they did times tables and spelling words and states and capitals, see. They did a lot of flashcards that year, Mei and Scar did, because even though he hadn't asked her to, Mei was set on straight A's, perfect scores, the very top. More competitive, more steadfast, certainly with a better purpose.)

(On top of no longer being able to help her with her homework as she moved into middle school, Scar also hadn't anticipated Mei leaning over his Pre-Algebra textbook with a pencil and a smile, because oh, they'd done that in Honors Math last year, Uncle Scar, do you need help? I can show you how to do this.)

(It was a flow. A give and take. Scar taught Mei self-defense, Mei taught Scar how to find the value of x, as an example)

Pre-Algebra with Professor Klemin on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays was a quiet and focused fifty minutes, very unlike his Intro to Government class with Dr. Grumman on Tuesdays and Thursdays. A large lecture hall filled with probably a hundred freshmen students, Scar sat in the back and found that his aging professor, though short and thin, gripped the room with an iron fist and a laugh on his face. Grumman had been part of the old military school staff but it didn't quite show; it wasn't just that he was more cavalier than someone like Armstrong (although, who wasn't more cavalier than someone like Armstrong?), there was something about the way Grumman talked about his subject was reminiscent of a game of Battleship. That politics were a game to be played and nothing more. Scar could concede he was learning things he hadn't quite known after years on the ground level, but the sensation of detachment felt odd, odder than being the odd, old man out in a room of adults who weren't close to being grown, odder than sitting at a desk and taking notes on the importance of local elections.

"What you learn in this class," Grumman's voice projected naturally in a way Scar expected from a man with twice lung capacity, "is effectively useless until it is put in praxis. I will lecture, you will take notes, be given assignments and exams, and move on. The information given in this course is only as good as what you do with it as a citizen in the city, state, and country."

At the front of the room, a particularly young (and seemingly, despite sitting down at a desk, short) student rose his hand after this statement as he had after almost every thought Grumman gave aloud. Sitting beside him, the generally smarmy-looking Teacher's Assistant who's name Scar had already forgotten (Rudy? Ron?) leaned over to say something to the student, yet again, which made him drop his hand slowly, yet again.

(Scar wondered what it meant to have been in praxis before being given the theory.)

But there was a point to be learned, here, Scar could concede yet again, whether he was wedged between two girls gossiping about sorority rush rumors or behind a young man intently focused on a game of solitaire on his laptop. Whether he watched the (he hadn't even said anything, Scar just thought he looked smarmy) TA grow exasperated from the never-ending questions posed by the (particularly short? Young?) student seated square at the front of the room or noticed the number of students who looked like him seated at desks was pathetically low, but present. Whether he intended to or not, putting faces to the broad population of people he'd been hired to protect (with parking passes and an organized lost and found) was, well - 

"It's important," Miles' voice had grown serious over the phone, and Scar found himself listening closer. "There aren't a lot of places with a student population quite this intense, this interesting, but I suppose that's still the military school reach. But even when it's dull, I find that the work I do on this campus is important for their sense of trust or belongingness. It's important to me that each student feels they can do their best work here, and that they find they can trust guys like us."

"What do you mean?"

"Guys who look like us."

(Scar's brother had been an easy target since day one, if he was being honest. It didn't matter if he was older, Scar was still stronger, bigger, and a much better fighter. There was a time, growing up, where Scar seemed to spend every day after school clocking bullies in the nose to defend his older brother's honor. Maybe it was his scrawny limbs or his glasses or the nose he kept in books or the fact that he just looked too damn kind, if not malleable, but he was ostracized, pummeled, taken advantage of. Scar didn't understand and didn't need to: that was his brother, his big brother, his hero, really, and so he'd show up _and_ shut them all up, every single time.)

(He'd once been told by his brother, deep into a late night of times tables, that his brother wished he could be more like Scar. He was strong but also smart, he'd been assured in a way he'd never been told before, smart in a physical way, in a personal way, that gave him this kind of innate understanding of how the world worked. Like he could look at someone and know their intentions, and knew exactly how to move his body, and did so seamlessly, meeting the world where it was. Like he knew who he was and was unafraid. Scar watched his brother shuffle flashcards and admit he could never do such a thing, that he was good for books and bad jokes and not much else. Scar was perplexed by this announcement, given he was the one who'd gone to his brother to ask for help, very afraid of facing the classrom, yet again, having forgotten how multiplication worked. yet again. But it'd been important, he supposed, to be told such a thing.)

Scar returned home every night at 7 PM, giving him enough time to sit Mei down for dinner by 8. These days he found himself thankful for the faceless names of Lan Fan and her grandfather, Fu, who had been hosting a martial arts club after school that Mei was going to now, giving her less time to spend all by herself in the new condo. The bar wasn't high for him: Scar thought if she just went out, made one friend, it would be a good, strong start, and he could relax . But Mei, uninterested in good starts, bounded throughout the kitchen, cutting sweet potatoes and grabbing spices from the counter and not tripping over Xiao Mei even once, and told him the ins and outs of what her new school was like, what her friends were like, and whatever detail she deemed important enough to include. 

(Mei called him out once, as she was speaking. "Hey! Are you listening to me?" It didn't occur to him that he had at any point stopped listening to her, because he hadn't, but apparently being quiet and still was not the feedback she was looking for, so Scar made a point to at least nod as she spoke, so she would see some kind of affirmation lest she feel she shouldn't continue. Except there were nights were Scar found himself headbanging harder than he ever had at any punk shows he'd gone to in his youth. He was getting old, such activity could give him a headache if he affirmed too hard.)

(It didn't mean she wouldn't test him every so often.)

"...and Paninya was like, super convinced that's how it's supposed to work, but then Lan Fan was like 'there's no way' and then I was like 'I think my Uncle Scar should let me get a tattoo'..."

"Absolutely not," Scar interjected what was likely the first full sentence he'd contributed since they'd sat down at the dinner table, Xiao Mei drawing figure-eights between their chairs. 

Mei grinned. "But _you_ have a tattoo. A big one," she pointed out what was true, a valid point.

He grunted, mostly in defeat, and she laughed at him. Scar was not quite in the position to tell anyone not to get a tattoo if he was being honest. "Graduate high school, then we can talk."

"I was _kidding,_ " Mei stressed, pushing her peas to the corner of her plate as she was prone to do. "I was just making sure you were still alert."

"Alert?"

"You know, to make sure you get all your homework done. College is like, objectively harder than middle school, you probably still have a lot of work to do tonight, right?"

"You don't worry about _me_ getting _my_ homework done, _I_ worry about _you_ getting _your_ homework done," Scar chewed for a few beats. "And also about you wanting a tattoo now, apparently."

"I promise was kidding but if you wanted to give me some kind of incentive for not getting a tattoo, I would love to hear it," Mei said, waggling her eyebrows. Scar's standard stoic expression remained, however funny she was.

"Eat your peas."

"I  _will._ " 

(Mei was going to get to live as a normal kid, this was not to be debated. Her sense of safety, her sense of trust, her sense of belongingness at the top and all the way down to the stuffed panda she still slept with at night, this was Scar's real responsibility, if he believed he was so important to make this about him in any way. Because it wasn't about him, none of this was about him at all, it was about Mei: Mei would have a good life, Mei would have a safe life, Mei would have nothing in her way of doing whatever pointless tween thing or mature, smart student thing or any _thing_ in between that she wanted to do. No ifs. No ands. No buts. No Scars.)

(That's what this was for, that's what this was for, that's what this was all for.)

It's 10 PM when Mei finally calls it quits and meanders to bed, although it's still a full process to keep her from getting distracted and stay up longer than she needs to (just because she could technically wake up on time with an hour less of sleep didn't mean she _had_ to). She will pat Xiao Mei if she's low enough on her scratch post to reach, she will kiss Scar on the top of his forehead and bid them both goodnight, as she climbs the stairs up to what he is sure is another half hour of her watching videos on her phone, but he wouldn't press. It would have to be close enough, as Mei was right, he does, in fact, have more work to do. The kitchen table, his old foe, and Xiao Mei are his only company as he studies and does his homework, and frankly, neither of them are so helpful. Walls of dense history text and the old game of putting letters in numerical equations were decent lullabies, though. The two hours between opening his books and letting his head hit the pillow moved fast.

And tomorrow he would do it all again. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> links to the art in the fic: https://bunsik.tumblr.com/post/189222043302/new-friends-thick-as-thieves-watched-a-ton-of / https://bunsik.tumblr.com/post/189050102837/sparring-practice-so-no-one-can-mess-with-the-new


	3. october symphony

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what's up it's been a while
> 
> i was busy applying to grad school for early admit so I didn't have to pay the $90 admissions fee, i'm sure you all understand
> 
> hope this fic has been as fun to read as it is to write!

Wenling told him herself one day, some chilled October morning, where it was just the two of them for some reason, while Mei entertained herself on the local park’s jungle gym, back east in their hometown. They’d been in an otherwise familiar and comfortable silence for most of the morning, watching the tiny kindergartener run abound in a big pink marshmallow coat and matching magenta ribbons perched atop her head, giggling to herself. However, Wenling’s mind was elsewhere, had been elsewhere the whole day, and like a leaf falling onto the still park pond, was bound to cause a ripple.

“Mei has siblings,” she’d said, finally, tugging her thick, heavy parka closer to her small frame, her face nothing short of controlled and neutral. “Half-siblings. From her father, not me.”

(Wenling had been beautiful, with a youthful face that was often mistaken for being much younger and more innocent than her experiences had made her. Mei, as she was starting to grow older, similarly kept her mother’s round cheeks and soft skin, whole-hearted eyes, but without the smile that didn’t want to talk about it.)

“How many?” Scar had asked her, as it seemed like the only thing to ask when in the following stretch of silence he realized she wouldn’t expound of her own accord.

“I don’t even know,” Wenling scoffed, forcing a smile, crossing her arms, sinking. “There was a woman he’d loved and left long before his first wife, I think. But there was no _alliance_ to be had there –“ a rare show of distaste “- ‘cause she was white and had no money, you know, so they drew their lines in the sand to separate themselves from her and the baby. I think she had a boy.”

(The Family was a recurring theme in these stories of Wenling’s past – be it her family or This Other Man’s family, Scar suspected the ties went deeper than most typical, if conservative or traditional, family ties went.)

(But it was easy to see in the way Wenling walked how she had spent her life navigating on her tip toes around broken glass, taking her place on the lower rungs as the Changs attempted to survive in whatever power game they were playing to impress someone insatiable, someone powerful, if not criminal.)

“And at some point, there was his first wife. I don’t know the sexes of those children, but there were two, as I’ve been told, very close in age.”

(Mei didn’t walk the same way her mother did. Scar wondered if the cadence in one’s steps was not something hereditary.)

“His second wife had a son not even three years older than Mei. I had no idea they were still together when I’d met him. No one told me, not until it was too late,” Wenling huffed, pushing her cropped dark hair behind her ear nervously, simple silver ring glinting in what little light the day offered. Scar had remained as still as he could possibly hold himself, as though any movement on his end would prevent her from being allowed to take her time. “I never would’ve let it get as far as it did if I’d known, but to everyone else, what’s yet another mistress? And I just didn’t _think_ at all, I just knew he was _nice_ to me…

“And all of a sudden I was pregnant, and my family needed me to play nice because his family was powerful, putting it mildly, and I just -”

“-couldn’t keep it up,” Scar finished slowly, when Wenling trailed off, pulling a pack of tissues from the corner of her purse reserved for the things she kept, always, for Mei.

(Two people, walking through the desert, and one stopping to carry the other.)

“There’s probably been children since Mei,” Wenling continued, after collecting herself. “I don’t know. He’d never tell me now, even if I could contact him. My family would never tell me now that I’ve left, even if they’d pick up the phone. Last I was told, he was on his third wife, and he moved way out west for work.”

“Do you miss them?” asked Scar, not to challenge, but to know. He’d been looking straight ahead, watching Mei climb up and down the long tin slide, but he was able to sense Wenling shake her head, fervent.

“I will say, I don’t know what I would’ve done without your brother and you. And,” Wenling was like a hawk, eyes twitching with every clumsy move of Mei’s, calculating how errant she could be lest she injure herself, “well, don’t you think she’d be a good sister?”

(“I want someone to look after her the way you two look after each other.”)

“Uncle Scar! Uncle Scar!” Two little pink arms were waving at him through the dull grey of the day, just below eye level. Mei’s nose was as red as the leaves falling from the trees, her round face almost comical, wrapped up like it was a blistering winter day and not just a few degrees short of chilly. “Come push me on the swing!”

Wenling let out a dry laugh, standing up to dust off her coat. “I’m sorry she calls you that. We’ve been working on your real name, but when she sees you it’s like she forgets.”

“I don’t mind,” Scar paused, nothing the light pressure he’d grown used to between his eyes and along the bridge of his nose. “It suits me.”

* * *

Noise complaints were usually nothing more than a knock on the door and a stern warning, just to satisfy an annoyed RA. Smell complaints were the same, if not more embarrassing. To get both, with complaints explicitly stating that the Rush Dorm floor was beginning to smell like a literal, actual farm, was…still not exciting, but a welcome break in Scar’s day to go walk around instead of being cooped up at his desk, centered and stale between four white stone walls.

The two freshman who’d been reported were bundles of nerves as soon as they’d opened the door, the physical manifestation of their carelessness standing before them in an unmoved, scowling six-foot-five frame. One was quite tall, but still not as tall as Scar, still in braces, at least as far as could be seen behind a quivering lip; the other was shorter, with bright red hair, who probably already sweat considerably, but had been sweating profusely from “hello”. Scar, on the other hand, caught a whiff of their supposed crime as soon as the air swept through the open door to hit him - he’d worked on farms, but the room, wall-to-wall with Star Wars posters and scattered engineering assignments, smelled like a dump, worse than the stench of a typical teenage boy and worse than any manure spread.

There was supposed to be a protocol when knocking on dorm doors; Scar forgot as soon as the two, pimpled sci-fi fans started rambling in unison.

“Whatever they said, the rumors aren’t true,” said the tall one, feigning confidence.

“I’msorryI’msorryI’msosorryI’msosorry,” said the redhead, the eyes behind his big poofy hair wide with fear.

(He knew he could be intimidating, but this was ridiculous.)

“So which is it?” Scar asked, but he was unable to cut through the shrill explanations spilling from the mouths of either young man before him.

Not in the way the soft, prolonged _squeak_ did.

It was like the twinkle of a tiny bell or the first few patters of rain on the roof, but it was there, and seemed to echo in the soundless trance the two freshmen were stuck in.

Silence.

Another squeak.

Scar’s brows furrowed with slow realization.

(There were few things in this world that smelled and squeaked.)

(But it couldn’t be, right? It wouldn’t be?)

After a few glances between the frozen adolescents, Scar realized he’d have to find the words himself. He sighed. “There’s not a rabbit in here, is there?”

And there was, indeed, a real bunny, grey and soft, nestled in some hay inside a small, black-barred cage, hidden carefully behind a sheet under someone’s ridiculously tall elevated bed. The contents of the cage – the hay and the poop and the steamed carrots from the mess hall - certainly explained the smell. The RA had specifically complained about late night thumps and bumps, almost like someone was running around the room and knocking over furniture (or, what was likely in this case, chasing their bunny around the room, trying to get him back in his cage). It went without saying that smell complaints or noise warnings were petty in comparison to the repercussions that came with housing an animal in the campus dorms, even if Scar couldn’t quite remember what they were, but it wasn’t as though it mattered in the greater scheme of the situation.

(Ears back, eyes wide, in the furthest corner in a dark cage, but quiet. The squeaks were maybe distress signals? Cries for help? But like his foolish and negligent owners, the bunny was frozen in place waiting for the worst.)

(They felt like kin, Scar and this bunny.)

“We are _so_ sorry, man,” started the tall one, his voice cracking.

“Oh my god, I’m gonna lose my scholarship,” cried the redhead.

“Our asses are grasses and administration is the mower.”

“My mom is gonna _kill me_.”

Scar moved slow, opening the cage with a light _clink_ , his hand reaching inside only to stop in the center, as stock-still as the grey bunny inside. This hand was dangerous, at least to the rabbit, but maybe, with some patience…and some composure…

(Of all the jobs he’d worked, one of his favorites was the rescue pet shelter gig. He worked nights, as he was, as mentioned, six-foot-five, and the shelter was in a part of town that many of his coworkers feared to tread into once the sun went down. There weren’t a lot of things to do at three in the morning besides keep watch over the door and keep the dogs, the cats, and the occasional rabbit - or parrot, or snake, the list went on - calm, soothed, relaxed. He learned a lot, about body language, about communicating without words.)

It didn’t take long for the bunny to find itself under Scar’s fingers, leaning into the scratches hitting the sweet spot right behind his ears.

 (About how much he loved soft things.)

It took even less time for the rabbit to hop out the open cage door, nestling quietly into Scar’s lap as he sat criss-cross on the floor, still scratching him along the top of his head and slowly petting along his smooth back.

“That’s K-2SO,” said the redhead, weakly. “ _Surprise._ ”

“You mean was K-2SO, before we got reported,” the tall one moaned.

“I’m not going to report it,” Scar said, finally, and then reluctantly, “and I’m not going to take it.”

K-2SO squeaked again when his owners gasped, almost exaggeratedly shocked. “ _You’re not_?”

“No.”

Scar paused, sparing a glance toward his new friend, K-2SO, thinking hard about what needed to happen next.

(Blink twice if you want to get out of here, K-2SO. Shake your bunny tail. Ask if you can.)

“You’re going to get rid of it yourselves.”

Sputters and protests, resistance and foot-stomping. “But – but… _But_ –“

“He wasn’t meant to sit in the dark all day, eating dorm food and staring at the wall.” That was their job, technically. “You’ll get rid of him, for his own benefit.”

“I - ” the tall one physically deflated, as though he shrunk six inches in height, “ _fine_.”

“When you put it that way…” the red-head conceded, resigned to frown at his feet.

(Be free of your shackles, K-2SO, and may the wind be always at your back, and so on, and so on.)

It took very little convincing after that; the boys would have the rabbit removed by the end of the week, and they would give their dorm a good clean, maybe open a goddamn window. In return, Scar would tell the RA they were just smelly and noisy and needed a talking to, no reports to turn in, no scholarships to be lost. The boys were googling local pet shelters to visit at the end of the day when Scar left them, but not before he gave the rabbit one scratch on the head before he left.

And that was as exciting as work got to be these days.

Not that he needed his work to be exciting, quite the opposite really. But the work he’d been assigned as of late kept him cooped in the office, and away from the technicolor trees and the leaves crunching under his feet. Central had a more temperate climate than his childhood hometown and campus was beautiful, idyllic during class time when the sidewalks were mostly empty and Scar could be left alone to take deep breaths, spare some gratitude, appreciate the ambiance of the nature around him.

The job was more reading than anything else, more reading than Miles had let on. He was assigned to keep up with local news, crime article on top of crime article on top of hollow and otherwise unrelated crime article. Armstrong was nothing if not dedicated, he supposed, to keeping the campus safe. Crime in the city is mere feet away, she said, her stern voice echoing in his subconscious, from infiltrating the campus. Other peoples’ problems became their problems, other citizen’s dangers could endanger the campus. And that was unacceptable.

(Reading the news and reading holy text were two different strands of difficult for someone who already struggled with reading. There wasn’t much fear to be had in The Word, there wasn’t much hope to be had in muggings, robberies, house fires, drug busts. In the end, though, they both made him want to pray to God up above, if for completely, starkly different reasons.)

But what was worse than reading the same sentence over and over or the sterile feeling under the lights of the Security Office was the way that Officer Armstrong tended to hover over him. He couldn’t decide if she was bored or just persistent, given the number of times she checked in for updates and would be starkly disappointed in him when he had nothing new to report. If he didn’t know better, or maybe if he was invested enough to find out, it was like she _wanted_ there to be bad news; if he didn't know any better, he might think she was looking for something.

(“It’s the military dog in her,” Miles shrugged. “It’s not personal.”)

(“It’s never personal,” said Scar.)

(Miles hummed. “I don’t know if I’d go that far.”)

Peering through the hallway window to the security office, back inside the Wellesley Building now, he watched his boss at work. Armstrong was the only one in the vast white space, everyone else out of the office with other tasks. She eyed a spread of newspapers scattered across her desk from behind a cascade of blonde hair, meticulous, intent, focused. Given, she was always like that, but the way her fingers drummed her elbow where her arms crossed her chest, she seemed to be growing _impatient_.

(As though she was looking for something.)

Scar had but two feet back into the office before, lo and behold, Armstrong’s shiny, blonde head popped up from where it’d been looming in a single-minded focus. “How was the noise call?”

“Nothing special,” he replied without so much as a pause. “Didn’t need more than a reminder to clean up after themselves, be mindful of the building they share with other students.”

“That’s usually all they need,” Armstrong stated, none the wiser. “The RAs this year are exceptionally paranoid, and almost completely unwilling to figure out their own problems or warn their own charges. It’s sad, frankly.”

“It was wise to check,” Scar offered, sliding off his coat and sinking into his seat while his mind wandered fondly to K-2SO, hopping around somewhere sunny.

The warm and fuzzies dissipated almost immediately, however, upon opening his desk drawer and clicking the home button on his phone, just to check the time. Three missed calls from a number that wasn’t saved in his contacts and one voice mail message.

(Don’t be important, don’t be important, don’t be important.)

Holding up the phone to his ear, he held onto every other word that ran reedy through the line, his free hand flying up to pinch the bridge of his nose, right along the raised tissue of his scar.

_“This is…Principal of Central High, calling on behalf…Mei Chang…was in a fight with some of the upperclassmen…your presence is requested at the school immediately…”_

Somewhere in the back of Scar’s mind rang a quiet, but emphatic _noooooooooooo_. He held that, high and tight in his chest and shoulders until he exhaled and clicked his phone screen off. He stood up tall, almost as slowly as he’d sat down, reaching for the jacket he had just taken off to sling his growingly heavy arms back into.

Mei had gotten into a fight? Mei? Had gotten into? A fight. At school. At the _high school_.

Remembering how tall and grown the high schoolers always looked made Scar’s frown deepen, were that even possible.

“Where do you think you’re going?” asked Armstrong, just as he fastened the zipper, her typical edge missing somewhat this time when she looked up at her desk to scrutinize him.

Scar didn’t stop preparing to leave, however. “I need to go pick up my niece from school,” he replied, simply, sliding open his empty metal desk and pulling out his keys before Armstrong could snip at him once more, as he anticipated.

But she didn’t. Did not deride or command him to sit down, take his place, forget about anything that wasn’t his duty to Central State U. Instead, she peered at him quizzically.

“You’re her legal guardian, correct?” Armstrong asked, admittedly judgmental, but in a way that made  Scar stop where he stood at the edge of his desk, made him think he was being assessed, rather than challenged.

He gave her the truth. “Yes.”

Armstrong nodded, looking back down at the papers at her desk, back up at him. He was the New Guy, after all, and there were rules about this kind of thing. She could technically make him stay, tell him to take off his coat and phone a friend. She could give him the ultimatum: leave now and leave your badge as well. She could have responded a lot of ways, but Scar didn’t have time to run through them all before her nose went back to its usual up-turned sort of scorn. “Don’t let her make a habit of this. You’re dismissed.”

Scar blinked. Somewhere, a braver and perhaps more foolish version of himself would’ve had something sharp and pointed to say to that. Something just callous enough that could stop Armstrong’s hovering mid-flight, something that would say he would not be told what to do about anything, let alone Mei, but wouldn’t get him fired, although something in him whispered _would it be so bad if you got fired?_ Yes, it would (no, it wouldn’t), Scar had a plan (he could, hypothetically, develop a new plan), a mission, a goal, one that he would do anything to complete (okay, except lay down and roll over for, and definitely not for Armstrong).

However, he was this version of himself, and instead would fume over the words, repeating them over and over like a scratched record on a turntable, as he white-knuckled the steering wheel of his mini-van, driving in silence from Central State to Central High.

(He was grateful for the mostly clear roads as he drove, the sun in the sky for leading the way, his feet for carrying him through the parking lot and up the stairs to the front hall of the school where children who looked like grown people and towered over his niece traipsed about, clumsy and reckless and God what _the hell_ was she doing here - ?)

The walls to the front office were glass, and Scar could look into the scene folding out before him like a cage at the zoo, like a picture on the wall.

On one side of the room sat Mei, arms folded and frown proud and righteous. That would’ve been a given no matter what had unfolded today, as though Mei could ever be accused of being timid, or sheepish, or apathetic. She sat with head held decidedly high, bouncing her leg erratically with residual energy, her jeans torn at the knee to reveal two large bandages. Beside her constant movement was a very still boy Scar didn’t immediately recognize, with braces on his legs and a crutch leaning up against his chair, and it was here that he ran through, over and over under his breath, the list of names Mei mentioned when talking about her friends at school, at martial arts club, and so on.

(He probably wasn’t the shy but determined Lan Fan, probably wasn’t the hasty but clever Paninya, probably wasn’t the stubborn but kind-hearted Winry. Ling read more as someone frivolous and hasty when Mei described him, and Edward, Mei would say with the roll of her eyes, was awfully hot-headed for someone so small. The concerned crease in his forehead, the persevering fold of his hands were the clues, if Scar had to guess who this particular friend was.)

(Scar granted, the way Mei talked about Alphonse, he couldn’t help but imagine a knight, complete with shining armor; the assumption was on him.)

(“Alphonse is Al’s full name.” “Right.” “He’s your friend?” In high school, no one had mentioned he was in high school. “He’s just nice to me!”)

On the other side of the room, seated with intention, were two mountains of boys in matching varsity jackets, pouting and frowning, one with a bright red nose that had clearly been bleeding not too long ago, one with a snarl and a black eye. If looks could battle, if not kill, Scar imagined he was watching a Jedi battle of glares, Mei nimble with a pink lightsaber, Black Eye, heavy with a red one.

“Mr…Chang?” called the receptionist somewhat awkwardly over her desk, noticing that Scar had not come into the office yet. Too many sets of eyes turned to look at him all at once, no one’s going wider than Mei’s. Alphonse, he noticed, gave a small but polite wave.

“Not a Chang,” Mei corrected softly, but the receptionist seemed to pay no mind as she waved Scar into the front office with one well-manicured hand, and pointed down the hall toward a series of smaller offices, reserved for the administration. The principal had been waiting for him, the receptionist nearly groaned, and would be ready to see him whenev -

“Are you alright?” Scar’s gut wouldn’t settle before he had the chance to ask, and that would have to come at the expense of irritating the receptionist further.

“ _Excuse me_ -“

Mei blinked, her frown melting and making way for her more typical half-smile. “I’m okay,” she said, in a way that told Scar that was only partially true, but that confirmation would have to do for now.

“Are you alright?” Scar then asked Alphonse, unintentionally gruffer.

The boy was not startled if a bit surprised he’d been asked in the first place. “I’m fine,” Alphonse replied, his smile much more genuine. “Thanks to Mei.”

(Fascinating.)

Scar stole a glance toward Mei as the receptionist grew more persistent and prepared to push him into the principal’s office herself; Mei responded with an almost apologetic shrug, expression falling into a slight wince.

(He knew what that face meant, and what he was about to get into now. After all, this was by no means Scar’s first trip to the principal’s office after a fistfight, he understood all of the complex emotions that entailed. He did, however, think his last brush with the top school authority was far in the past.)

(His experience didn’t make the sputtering, fuming mess of a high school principal any less perplexing, and didn’t make the gritty details of Mei’s day any less concerning. It’d been lunch hour on the lawn when she had seemingly attacked two upperclassmen without warning. Well, they’d had it coming, technically; they’d stolen her lunchmate’s walking device, but fights were uncalled for and strictly No-Tolerance in the school’s policy, Mr. Chang. This isn’t a boxing ring, Mr. Chang. I don’t know how they did things at her old school back east, but this isn’t how we act here, Mr. Chang.)

(“Mr. Chang” thought they deserved it as equally as he found himself sick at the idea of Mei getting into fights outside of her martial arts classes. Granted, he also would’ve liked to see how Mei’s right-left hook was looking these days, but apparently that’s not how they do things here.)

She’d wound up with an all-day Saturday detention at the end of it, on the grounds of having thrown the first punch. It was? Fine? It was bullshit, but it wasn’t about him, either. Mei had never, ever done anything like this, but Mei had thrown the punch, Mei would have to take the detention, and Mei would wind up spending four years in this school after eight grade, and with this principal (lest something unfortunate happen to him…) (kidding, kidding). Centering whatever protective, paternal, righteous fury he had wouldn’t be fair to her here, and wouldn’t be fair to her when he walked out of the principal’s office. He had to remain his usual calm, relaxed – not so tense – and let her have her own time to process without his influence.

(That was. Probably? The parental thing to do.)

(Oh, but he was so mad.)

Mei and Alphonse were talking quietly between themselves when the principal finally released Scar from his sweaty, sweaty grip; he left back through the hall of offices once more, thoroughly reminding himself with each step to release the pressure in his shoulders.

(“Do you need a ride home?” “No, my dad’s coming, he’s just late.” “Are you sure? I’ll wait for you.” “No, that’s okay, just cross your fingers he gets here before Edward and his wrath do.”)

But the tension just moved from his already square, broad shoulders into his face and already heavy, angry-looking brows. “Are you ready to go?” Scar asked, looking down upon the pair, the question coming out more guttural than intended.

Mei’s face paled; she _so clearly_ thought she was in trouble. “I need to go get my backpack from my locker at the middle school…”

(Oh no, too intense, too intense. Try again?)

“Alright,” he near-rumbled (Damn it, that was worse). “I’ll wait in the car.” Mei just nodded, seemingly resigned to her fate as she scurried out of the office with a wave to Alphonse and a tongue out at the seething boys on the other side of the room. Scar departed on her heels, much less swiftly, chastising himself for blowing it, but not chastising himself enough to miss shooting a glare at the knuckleheaded high schoolers on the other side of the office, who stared up at him wide-eyed.

(His brother would’ve done better at things like this, he thinks. Like not looking clearly, transparently pissed off when he was totally enraged, and not being a stiff, angry-looking man when his daughter needed him to be cool around her friends, with her principal, and so on.)

(It was what it was, he told himself. He had time to be what he was supposed to be, or at least the car ride home to make it alright.)

The students were starting to leave for the day, piling onto buses or getting into their parents’ cars as Scar waited at the far end of the parking lot, music off. He watched through the rearview mirror, somewhere in the sea of pedestrians and kids on bikes, as Mei trudged across the concrete, her braided pigtails keeping time with her steady pace, her eyes on the ground before her. She pulled open the door with a sigh, set her bookbag on the floor with a certain amount of concentration, and closed the passenger’s side door with a noted effort not to slam it.

Mei started spilling as soon as she buckled herself in, like her mouth was the cave to a waterfall. “They stole Alphonse’s crutch,” she nearly cried; Scar would be lying if he said he was able to catch every word she said when she said it. “Sometimeshegoeswithoutitbutusuallyheneedsitandtheystoleittomakehimwalkwithoutitlikehe’sfakingsomehowandtheylaughedathimandkepttryingtotriphimandIgot. So. Mad. _I knocked one on his ass._ ”

“Mei.”

“I’m sorry!” she cried, hands wringing her seatbelt. “I really am! I’m sorry you had to leave early and I’m sorry if you’re late to your class but I couldn’t let them just _harass_ him - ”

“Mei.”

“ – but I’m not sorry for _kicking ass_ – “

“Language, Mei.”

“Sorry, but I – “

“You’re not in trouble, I’m not mad,” Scar said, not raising his voice, but also not waiting for the water to stop. They’d been magic words, one would think, from the way Mei blinked at him from the passenger’s seat, face contorting as she went through all the phases connecting shock to realization.

“Wait, you’re not?” she asked, incredulous. “Mad, I mean.”

“No,” (not at all, truthfully), “you did the right thing.”

Mei narrowed her eyes at him curiously. “Giving Jay Thompson a black eye was the right thing to do?”

“Well…” (yes, yes it was) “You stood up for your friend,” (more people who endanger disabled children in that way should be punched, frankly) “when he needed someone most of all. That was the right thing to do.” (But what am I working for if you aren’t safe?)

She was just so emotional, and so empathetic, you know; he could almost hear the cogs in her mind processing his words amongst the sound of the car starting and the hum of the engine. Scar let a few beats of this symphony pass between them before he continued:

“I’m sorry I made you think you might be in trouble,” he said, decidedly not through a huff and a puff this time, but Mei just shook her head.

“I wasn’t worried I’d get in trouble, I just thought, y’know,” she kind of trailed off, leaning her head on the window, “maybe you’d be, I don’t know, _disappointed_ in me, or something.”

(Oh.)

(No way.)

He chose his next words carefully. “I don’t think you’ve ever disappointed me.”

(The cogs, they stopped.)

Mei didn’t reply, only offered a single, lonely _sniff_.

(If she started crying, he would start crying, that was just how this would play out.)

“But you should solve it peacefully next time,” Scar continued, monotone; he could sense Mei’s eyes roll back into her head, even if she wasn’t facing him in the passenger’s seat.

“You said you used to get in fights all the time,” she prodded with a challenge (and not with any tears, thankfully).

“That’s different.” (It wasn’t different)

“How?” (So many _questions._ )

“You’re much smarter than I was, you can do things differently.”

“Okay but what if I want to – “

“ _Don’t_ want to,” he replied, curt. “You’re new to town, you don’t need a reputation. You don’t need to worry about anyone else but yourself.”

(Bold words, coming from him.)

(But what would he do with himself if she ever worried too much about some of the other – any or all of the other – problems of the people around her and decided with her righteous and empathetic heart that she had to do something?)

“Okay, okay, okay,” Mei conceded, warmth and sun creeping back into her tone ever so slightly. “I’ll be better, I promise.”

(Oh.)

(That went well.)

Coming up on a stop sign, a few blocks from the school now, he took one hand off the steering wheel and held out to Mei but one pinky.

“Are you…?”

“Pinky promise,” he said, as serious as ever.

She laughed at this now, returning the gesture with her much smaller pinky wrapping around his and giving a firm shake. “Pinky promise.”

It was enough to last an S-T-O-P; upon pulling apart, he got just a few more seconds of driving in before something caught Mei’s attention out the window, her hand reaching out to tap his forearm as the van rolled along the suburban road.

“Uncle Scar, wait, stop the car,” she piped, poking and pointing at the glass. “That’s my friend, Edward.”

Scar grunted.

“Don’t be like that, stop the car real quick.”

But before he could come to a full stop, Mei had already rolled down the window, sticking her head out to wave at one of the many bicycle riders littering the sidewalk.

Specifically, the bicycle rider going against the crowd, toward the school. A bicycle rider Scar recognized, and recognized well from his GOV 102 course, as the young blond child always in the same red sweatshirt, clearly younger than anyone else in the room, raising his hand for nearly every question or pointedly pestering the TA he sat beside for every other question.

“Mei!” he called, turning his bike to pedal towards the car once she had successfully got his attention. (And they were familiar, the world was rather small wasn’t it?) “Thanks for taking care of Al.”

“He could’ve taken care of it himself, he’s very strong.” (Was she beaming? She was beaming.)

“He’s always been the more athletic brother.”

“Smarter too.”

“Hey!” Mei’s friend seemed to notice Scar out of the corner of his eye, blinking, “Oh hey, Mr. Mei’s Dad,” tone knowing, like he had some, if vague, recollection of Scar.

“ _Uncle_ ,” Mei corrected, turning her attention back towards him. “Uncle, this is Edward, Alphonse’s brother.”

“Uncle Mei’s Dad,” Edward greeted him (incredible), “you’re in my class at Central U, right? With Grumman?”

“I think so,” Scar replied. (He knew so.)

“You’re in the same college class?” Mei asked. “Wow, that’s impressive!”

“It’s a small world,” he almost said, but the two friends had begun to prepare a full recap regarding the day’s events, and so he turned his blinkers on instead, preparing to wait.

There was a conversation going on, Scar was sure, about punishment and detentions and all of that, but he wasn’t paying attention, instead carefully watching another, more peculiar teenager rolling up with his bike to the car through the van’s rearview mirror.

To put it simply, the boy, pushing his bike in a yellow tracksuit, with a long black ponytail, walked like Mei.

(Specifically, like Mei, and not like Wenling.)

“Ling! Hurry up and get over here!” Edward called, waving him on; Scar felt his heart brake to a stop.

So this was The Ling, he thought, watching as he jogged towards the car, slinging his arm over the window as he leaned into the conversation.

“Mei! Heard you got a 1-2 in on Thompson. Fuckin’ rad,” the boy snorted (like Mei), with a smile like a jack-o-lantern (not like Mei). “Fuck that guy,” (that was more like Mei than she’d admit).

Ed elbowed Ling in the gut, bobbing his head in Scar’s direction; Ling gave a wider grin and a lackadaisical wave. “Whoops, sorry Mr. Mei’s Dad –“

“Uncle –”

“Sorry Mei’s Uncle!” Ling replied, flashing a much more sardonic look than Scar sensed he intended (resting clown face? Not like Mei) before he turned back to talking to his two companions. The three of them chattered, Mei ramping up the dramatics of her story in all the ways she hadn’t earlier in the car ride, leaving Scar wave on cars behind him that weren’t sure if they could go around him or not.

(Not to beat the dead horse, but Scar had a brother. 29 years, Scar had spent as his younger sibling, getting irritated when someone mixed up their names, or commented on how much they looked alike even though they didn’t really look alike much at all, being told they sounded the same when speaking over the phone.)

(They didn’t look too similar, Mei and Ling, but it wasn’t about looking similar. Scar knew what it was like to look like someone, even if not identically, but in small ways that only molecules could ever determine: the turn of the head when thinking deeply, the crinkle of the nose when laughing, the cadence and tone when speaking, the similarities without being copies. And even if it was not so clear to anyone else, it was clear as day to him.)

(Ling and Mei were siblings.)

(And he wondered if they knew.)

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> that's an awful lot of star wars reference for someone who doesn't know anything abt star wars
> 
> UPDATE (11/17): just some quick news that I wanted to share now and will probably reiterate at the beginning of the next chapter
> 
> 1\. you can follow me on twitter at @_roxast  
> 2\. someone lovingly drew ART of this work!!! i dropped tumblr once i started focusing seriously on work/school bc i'm easily distracted and likely won't get one again, but if you have a tumblr, pls go show this artist some love!  
> piece 1: https://bunsik.tumblr.com/post/189025776597/uncle-scar-suspicious-of-meis-new-friend-from  
> piece 2: https://bunsik.tumblr.com/post/189050102837/sparring-practice-so-no-one-can-mess-with-the-new
> 
> \--
> 
> UPDATE (1/19/20): I added bunsik's art to the chapters they correspond to (you've probably seen them by now!) please support her on tumblr if you can!


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